Bleach Bleach questions thread

[Amodelsino]

That is wishful thinking. Once someone achieves Bankai they no longer need to use the release phrase.

To be fair, we never had specific confirmation that Aizen had Bankai. The Captains who 'saw' it were all under his spell, meaning the only suggestion he did is his statement that he has mastered all of the Shinigami arts, but we know that's not technically true anyway as he couldn't pull off a perfect Hado 90 and didn't have specific abilities that we know are still Shinigami arts like Shunko.

It's still more logical to think he'd have Bankai since he had plenty of time and talent (and no reason for him not to be trying to gain it as there is for Shunko), but it's still not technically confirmed at any point that I know of, and at this point the only confirmation possible is Kubo saying it.

EDIT: Wait, doesn't he release it without the name against Barragan? In which case that entire point is moot and his loss comes down to him being incredibly retarded.

 

[Knyght]

<a href='http://c.mhcdn.net/store/manga/9/43-371.0/compressed/b07.jpg' target='_blank' rel='nofollow'>No, he said it's name.</a> But he didn't say the command verb which was strange. Unless he only says that when ending an illusion.

EDIT: And I don't think that Aizen ever knew about Shunko. Soifon considered it a new invention and, despite being a captain and commander of the Onmitsukido, she didn't know the purpose of her sleeveless uniform.

Not that he couldn't have come up with it himself or even doing the same for the other combat styles, if such a thing is possible.

 

[Amodelsino]

EDIT: And I don't think that Aizen ever knew about Shunko. Soifon considered it a new invention and, despite being a captain and commander of the Onmitsukido, she didn't know the purpose of her sleeveless uniform.

That's the reason I said it had a reason for him not to have tried to learn it, that being that he may not have even known of it's existence. It's still a Shinigami technique though, not a unique unlearnable ability, and therefore he can't actually have mastered Kido and the other one (the name of which I can't remember) since there's still more to learn in those areas.

Of course, he hasn't mastered Kido anyway so meh.

On the sword, Ichigo released his with only saying the name. Of course he's sort of a special case and Aizen at least definitely has a phrase, but it's at least proof that it's possible for a Shikai to be released without a phrase.

 

[seitora]

I don't think we know Ichigo's release phrase either since he's permanently in Shikai

 

[Knyght]

He still had to release it the first time and he did so by just saying Zangetsu's name. We'd probably learn the whole thing if he could manage to seal Zangetsu and then re-enter shikai.

Shunsui was able to release with just a name against Stark and even Rukia did it when she first revealed her shikai. It seems that the release phrase itself isn't even necessary, only the name. Which makes me wonder why Kubo bothered with it in the first place, though some of them are quite badass.

EDIT: Though I find that whole issue confusing in the first place. Why do any of the captains bother to say the command and name of their zanpakuto when they can do it silently? The same with bankai which we saw Ichigo do silently against Grimmjow whilst Hitsugaya screamed out the whole title against Halibel.

 

[seitora]

Rule of cool, probably

 

[Knyght]

I'd say that doing something <a href='http://c.mhcdn.net/store/manga/9/32-279.0/compressed/M7_Bleach_Ch279_05.jpg' target='_blank' rel='nofollow'>like</a> <a href='http://c.mhcdn.net/store/manga/9/32-279.0/compressed/M7_Bleach_Ch279_06.jpg' target='_blank' rel='nofollow'>this</a> is considerably more badass than <a href='http://c.mhcdn.net/store/manga/9/39-339.0/compressed/bleach_339_13.jpg' target='_blank' rel='nofollow'>this.</a> Same with Renji silently stopping Byakuya's release and Shunsui releasing without reciting a poem.

Well, whatever. -_-

 

[~NGD OMEGA~]

Hard to say, coolness is relative. Both really have their points ultimately depends how the scene is presented.

However I will say that generally, anime wise at least, a pause quiet sort of impact moment with the phrase is generally more badass than either not saying it or screaming it. You know the ones, those silent sort of moments when the person in question lets the anger boil over as the music cuts out, letting the full Impact of the "Ban Kai" come to the fore before the sound kicks in again and shit gets real as they go full power. Komamura and Hitsugaya's first Bankai usages all those ages ago had blends of this, though sadly they weren't capitalized on because the fights were either cut short or skipped entirely.

Though I suppose that preference too depends on the individual. :huh.:

 

[seitora]

Komamura's Bankai release was awesome, though that may have been just because going "Bankai" at the same time a motherfucking GIANT comes out of nowhere is epic

 

[Knyght]

That's true. I literally just remember when Byakuya used bankai against Zommari who pulled it off quite well, imo.

EDIT: Favourite part of the Komamura bankai scene was his pose (and the giant's) which just said "Yeah, I'm about to level this whole block just to cut you down".

EDIT2: Scratch that, ever part of that scene was my favourite. ^_^

 

[zeebee1]

Urahara has an obvious opening to influence Ichigo to be immune to Aizen's illusions. Upon achieving Bankai Ichigo gains Zangetsu's sunglasses.

 

[seitora]

For reference, here's the whole scene with Komamura activating Bankai


<a href='http://c.mfcdn.net/store/manga/9/17-148.0/compressed/_manga_rain_bleach_ch148_16.jpg' target='_blank' rel='nofollow'>http://c.mfcdn.net/store/manga/9/17-148.0/...ch_ch148_16.jpg</a>
<a href='http://c.mfcdn.net/store/manga/9/17-148.0/compressed/_manga_rain_bleach_ch148_17.jpg' target='_blank' rel='nofollow'>http://c.mfcdn.net/store/manga/9/17-148.0/...ch_ch148_17.jpg</a>
<a href='http://c.mfcdn.net/store/manga/9/17-148.0/compressed/_manga_rain_bleach_ch148_18_19.jpg' target='_blank' rel='nofollow'>http://c.mfcdn.net/store/manga/9/17-148.0/...ch148_18_19.jpg</a>

Short, to the point, and freaking epic.

now if only somebody could post the anime episode and the exact time spot



EDIT: Also, recalling the weakness of Komamura's bankai, I half-hope Bambietta tries to use it against him, only for Komamura to somehow beat his bankai and use its weakness against her. If only. Too bad doggie will likely get LOLNO

 

[~NGD OMEGA~]

I somehow still get chills reading that. It's Komamura's gaze there, the epitome of no longer giving a shit as he activates it that does it. Such a shame that fight didn't go anywhere, I'd have loved to see the two of them throw down. :sisi:

 

[zeebee1]

With the damage transfer flaw Zaraki would win.

 

[Knyght]

Do we have any idea when Kaien died?

EDIT: Rukia was apparently adopted into the Kuchiki 40 years before canon, so it's somewhere in that time period. And Ganju was a kid at the time though that doesn't say much given the weird aging in SS.

 

[~NGD OMEGA~]

Yeah, you have a roughly 30 or so year window to work with, taking off a couple to compensate for both her actually becoming a shinigami and for Ganju to 'grow' a little. Not like anything particularly important happened in the meantime though to compensate, save that one comment by Ishida's dad about Isshin not having been in a shinigami for about 20 years.

 

[Knyght]

That's what got me thinking of it actually. I'm working with a theory that links Isshin to the Shiba and is partially the reason for its downfall. Shiba Isshin goes MIA and is assumed KIA, Kuukaku loses her arm at the same time and becomes unfit for duty and then the death of Shiba Kaien. Or it might happen in a different order depending on whatever's more plausible. A series of unfortunate events within a relatively short time-frame which lead to the Shiba's loss of status.

 

[seitora]

How precisely are Ilforte and Szayel brothers?

Like, they say they're brothers, but that just doesn't make sense. Ilforte was hanging around with Grimmjow as one of the Adjuchas before they got all turned into Arrancar, while Szayel was definitely not with them, and there's absolutely no hint that Grimmjow or any of his other Fraccion ever met Szayel beforehand.

 

[~NGD OMEGA~]

If you buy the novel, they were actually REAL brothers, Ilforte was a general a long time ago who gave hostages to his brother Syzael to experiment on, before Syzael died and ate Ilforte. Then eventually the two spit and became two hollows.

But that like much of the novel is rather silly, so it's best to ignore it. :snigger:

 

[seitora]

Well, if nothing else, I could just ignore the first four fifths of that and just have "Ilforte and Szayel split apart from the same Hollow", so a Starrk and Lilinette scenario but more permanent and they ditched each other. Then they could consider themselves brothers of a sort.

 

[seitora]

Random thought

Is there any reason for the specific order of the 13 divisions? And by that I mean, why are Unohana, Shunsui and Ukitake, basically the 3 oldest captains beside Yamamoto, spread out by the numbers with the 4th, 8th and 13th. I would have expected them to be captains of lower-numbered divisions like say 3rd, 5th and 7th. Instead it's like they created the 13th division a long long time ago and Ukitake has outlived a lot of his peers so the lower-numbered divisions have a lot of younger Captains.

 

[~NGD OMEGA~]

There doesn't appear to be a reason. Hell, even the 12th, probably among the most specialized of the divisions bar 2nd and 11th (The former of which mainly due to the fact that the captain of the 2nd can ALSO lead the secret corps rather than anything the 2nd does, and the later of which only barely qualifies as 'specialized') is only a recent thing.

Which is part of the reason why, when mentioned a while ago in one of the other threads, I proposed to restructure the entire Gotei from the ground up. 4-5 core divisions with 'commanders', each having several or more subdivisions with a particular bend to them that contributes to a whole, which is where the 'Captains' part would come in, being subdivision heads. Get some goddamn structure in there so it makes sense.

I believe I had it such that Unohana headed both Kido and the healing squads, Shunsui's division was more combat based, so he had to handle Kenpachi and the like, Ukitake was oriented more around administration, so they handled sending people out to the human world and the afterlife stuff, which likely pulls Tousen under his wing with the newspaper he heads.

Yamamoto of course heads all the shit as top dog and his division handled the more governmental stuff, like the science division and secret corps, hence he Soifon and Mayuri are all under one banner to get all the evil people destroyed in on go if desired.

Aizen I had as a possible fifth head to be oriented around a division based around investigations and security, hence Gin and Hitsugaya would be under his command with their own respective subdivisions. Which would naturally utterly wreck the dynamic of this entire division when only one of the subheads remains after the betrayal. :sisi:

 

[Knyght]

We know that Yamamoto, Unohana, Shunsui and Ukitake are the oldest living captains but have they been captains at the time of the Gotei's conception? It's possible that Yamamoto already had captains and at least Shunsui and Ukitake didn't join the ranks until later on.

 

[~NGD OMEGA~]

They were the first from his school to become captains, but presumably captains have been around for a while, certainly the title of captain commander was passed around quite a bit, especially considering it took Yamamoto around 1000 years after the creation of the school to become it. :sisi:

 

[Jeopardizer]

Seeing as divisions tend to run in the family, and the exemple of the 6th, my personal theory is that the captains were the heads/elders/most badasses of the big clans and some minor ones.